Kaycee Burtom, 11, empties out the recycling from one classroom during the Einstein's program earlier this month at Brentwood Middle School. Einstein's is a group of students at Brentwood who do service projects for their school that are earth based such as their own water well on campus and their own paper recycling.

Related Media

“Bengal Environment,” “Go Green,” “Einstein’s,” it doesn’t matter what you call them, the end result remains the same.

And for Brentwood Middle School science teacher Steve Swenson, getting students excited about community involvement and the earth is what teaching is all about.

“This isn’t about me,” Swenson said. “This is about the students learning how to take responsibility for their school and community.”

Brentwood had some sort of environmental afterschool club for several years before interest waned a few years ago. Then two years ago, Swenson decided to get things going with an added focus. “Einstein’s” was born.

The group, which consists of sixth, seventh and eighth graders with a love for science and philanthropy, takes on everything from paper recycling to drainage problems, wetland reclamation, designing memorials for students of the school who have died too early, rock gardens and billboards, among many other things.

Right now the group of 15-20 kids is trying to figure out how to build a new eco-friendly basketball court for the school.

“It’s really sad that elementary schools have better basketball courts than a middle school does,” said Brice Barker, a seventh-grader at the school. “But we want to build it so it’s not so flat of a plane and the water can run off. But we have to figure out how to run it off so it returns to the groundwater instead of storm water.”

The difference between this club and most after school activities is it is all student-led. Swenson just hangs around for guidance.

The kids do all the work, from devising the plan for whatever project they are working on to coming up with the finance plan, fundraising, proposal to the school and execution.

“Watching them go though the process of doing everything is the best part,” Swenson said.

Adam said the pressure can sometimes be a lot.

“Just trying to come up with an idea can be stressful,” said Adam Rotter, a sixth-grader. “But sometimes you come up with an idea that only benefits part of the school, so it’s nerve-wracking to find an idea that benefits the whole school.”

The club meets twice a week for an hour, and the kids said the best part of the club is that Swenson lets them do other things, too. Many of the kids play basketball and are involved with student council.

They all had varying reasons for joining, from a love for science to “sounded fun” to a great way to get out of the house. The district supplies busing for students to take part in the activity so that no one is kept from after-school clubs.

“I really want to help clean up the environment of my school and just help out the school in general,” Morgan Kirtley, 11, said.

Ethan Shepherd, an eighth-grader who spends every day collecting paper from classrooms to put in the recycle container, said every little bit helps.

“We produce enough (recycled materials) that we can’t do it without the dumpsters,” the 14-year-old said. “So we did the cost analysis; we wrote the grant; we got the approval, and we got the dumpster.”

Swenson added, “It was a big learning curve.”

But Hailee Armagost, 12, said it’s mostly about being able to work together to do good things for the school with a lot of fun thrown in.

“You get to make new friends,” she said. “We are learning how to make our school a better place and how to work as a group. It really helps with team building.”

Sherrie Peif covers education for The Tribune. If you have an idea for a feature, contact Sherrie at (970) 392-5632, by email at speif@greeleytribune.com. Follow her on twitter @sherriepeif.